End the Health Care Mandate?

Ron Paul, (R-Tx) has introduced a very short bill to "End the Mandate" in the health care bill that requires everyone to obtain a minimum amount of health care insurance or to pay a fine. This extremely short proposed bill (HR 4995) would simply end the mandate and would make no other changes in the health care legislation. One problem that has been mentioned by opponents of Paul's bill is that is does not also eliminate the mandate for insurance companies to provide coverage for people with a pre-existing condition. If Paul's bill were to become law, it would encourage people to wait until they have a medical problem before they buy health insurance. The insurance industry is therefore very likely to oppose this bill to end the mandate. And while I strongly support the sentiment about getting the government out of the health care business, I believe this is an overly simplistic solution that would create more problems in the unlikely event that it were to become law.

However, Paul has also introduced a more extensive bill (HR 5444) to repeal the entire Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act and to replace it with a number of changes in the law to encourage more competition in the health care industry and a more equal tax treatment of health care costs. The bill also offers a novel way to deal with the problem of malpractice during surgery. So while I can't support the bill to end the mandate, I can certainly support his bill to simply repeal the entire health care act and to eliminate some obstacles to competition in the health care marketplace.

Ending the mandate is a catchy sound-bite that grabs our attention, but like many sound-bites, it papers over some serious complications. I wish Paul's supporters would spend more time and effort in promoting his bill to simply repeal the health care act in its entirely. For more on this topic, see

End the Mandate
http://www.house.gov/apps/list/speech/tx14_paul/EndMandate.shtml

http://www.ronpaul.com/legislation/end-the-mandate/

http://www.chooseliberty.org/hr4995.aspx?pid=cz01

Private Option Health Care Act (Repeal the Health Care Act)
http://www.house.gov/apps/list/speech/tx14_paul/PrivateOptHealthcare.shtml

http://www.ronpaul.com/legislation/private-option-health-care-act/End the Health Care Mandate?

Vern
www.vernonjacobs.com